Brother Ijay

Standing Firm Against The Devil ( #4)
Undeterred by Persecution
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Stand firm against him, and be strong in your faith. Remember that your family of believers all over the world is going through the same kind of suffering you are. 1 Pet. 5:9 NLT

We started this reflection with God's call through Apostle Peter to all children of God to be on the alert because the devil is on parole everywhere like a roaring lion in search of whom he may devour.

We have looked at two avenues Satan use to attack–tricks and temptation. The third one is persecution. Let's look at it today.

Devil is hardly running out of strategies to actualise his mission to steal, kill and destroy. When he can't lure you with a bait, cast doubt in your heart about the word of God, he presents a difficult situation that will make you abandon God and offer your soul to him to kill and destroy.

In standing firm against the devil, we must be undeterred by persecution as they will surely come.

Unlike temptation, in which case, Satan deploys lies, deception and tricks to lure people away from the order of God, in persecution, he raises an army against you and that will force you to sin against God or suffer a certain degree of hardship or denial standing your ground.

The reality is that persecution doesn't feel good on the body and even your family and friends may not find it palatable. However, for the man or woman who has resolved to follow Christ, persecution is unavoidable. It's a matter of when it will come.

Yes, and everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution. But evil people and impostors will flourish. They will deceive others and will themselves be deceived. 2 Tim. 3:12‭-‬13 NLT

📍Therefore, when you choose to stand for righteousness and your unbelieving or backslidden parents ask you to reduce your age for any reason and you refuse because that's a lie and they choose to deny you privileges and treat your siblings better, it's the devil on the parole! Stand firm against him by standing for the truth and trusting God to take care of you.

📍When you choose to be a true follower of Christ who has understood that in the matter of marriage, it's immaterial where the potential spouse is from as long as the person is in Christ because we don't know anybody after the flesh (1 Cor 5:16-17) and choose to marry a child of God from another town or tribe, they will persecute you.

They will make you look like a terrible person for refusing to conform to their culture and traditions. Rich parents will threaten and eventually refuse to support you for the wedding. You know what to do? Stand firm against the pressure of the devil, irrespective of who he chooses to use.

📍The Satan that wants to destroy Nigerian youths will ask you to 'help' students in exams by arranging exam malpractice for them either as a parent, school owner or even government appointed supervisor.

As a true follower of Christ, you will say no to them and they will persecute you. They will fire you, call you names (like holier than thou) and speak all manner of evils against you to paint you bad. As they do all these or even worse, still stand firm against the devil by not succumbing to their pressure.

📍As you climb up in the food chain in the marketplace, you find that appointments and big contracts are hardly about competence alone but the relationships one has because most people are just competent at that level. Many of the people who make contract and appointment decisions are not of Christ even though they bear the titles Deacon, Knight and even Pastor.

When Satan uses them to make ungodly demands and you refuse as a follower of Christ, your ration of persecution will be activated. They will go all out with threats, confrontations and saying all manner of evils against you, calling you deputy Jesus and refusing to lift a finger to help you. Still stand firm against the devil by not yielding to Satanic demands.

Don't be scared one bit! The truth is that promotion doesn't come from the President, the Board Chairman or even the Archbishop, it's God that brings down a sitting governor and makes a small man President. (Psa. 75:5-7)

Just by the way, you are actually Jesus' deputy. He is in heaven and on this earth you are deputising for Him!

📍The world hasn't ceased from trying to make us worldly. It has intensified in this day of social media and cancel culture. As followers of Christ, we won't lose sight of the clear unambiguous injunction not to conform ourselves to the patterns of this world. (Rom 12:2)

So, we know and stand by the truth that Adam should marry Eve NOT Steve and we shout it on the streets of social media and TV. We insist that nkuri is allowed only between married couples and that 'baby mamaship' is not of God. We insist that the primary mission of the church is to introduce Christ to a sick and putrefying world, not CSR that companies should be doing.

For standing for this truth and saying it on your own social media space, they will come for you. They will drag you. They will dig out your past which Christ said it's passed away. They will shame you and recruit a mob of social media influencers to make you feel miserable. No matter what they do, don't yield to their pressures. Wake up another day and continue standing for the truth!

See, in the midst of persecution, it sometimes feels like God has abandoned you or you wonder if you are serving God different from that of Daniel.

God hasn't abandoned you; following Christ and being persecuted have been joined together (1 Thess 3:3-4) and nobody can separate it.

The world would love you as one of its own if you belonged to it, but you are no longer part of the world. I chose you to come out of the world, so it hates you.Do you remember what I told you? ‘A slave is not greater than the master.’ Since they persecuted me, naturally they will persecute you. And if they had listened to me, they would listen to you. (John 15:19-20 NLT)

⚠️A caveat please.

Some believers assume they are being persecuted when the reality is that they are just reaping just recompense of reward for their flaws. If you fail to prepare for an exam and fail, it's not persecution. You are disgracing Christ!

If you choose evangelism at the expense of your full time job and fail to meet up with the terms of your contract and get fired, it's not persecution. You are demarketing Christ seriously. Don't waste time praying against the so-called persecutor, ask God for Mercy and wisdom and He can get you reinstated.

If you, as a pastor, don't have enough sense to limit the sound from your Church to your members, have become a nuisance in a neighbourhood and they get the authorities to shut you down, it's not persecution. A mixture of zeal and ignorance pushed you into unreasonable practice.

If you are insulted because you bear the name of Christ, you will be blessed, for the glorious Spirit of God rests upon you. If you suffer, however, it must not be for murder, stealing, making trouble, or prying into other people’s affairs. (1 Peter 4:14‭-‬15 NLT)

Now, when we are truly persecuted for our faith in Christ, rejoice. Praise God. Celebrate. Buy suya or grilled fish and a good drink to wash it down. Play good music and dance. You know why? Here is Christ's verdict:

“God blesses you when people mock you and persecute you and lie about you and say all sorts of evil things against you because you are my followers. Be happy about it! Be very glad! For a great reward awaits you in heaven. And remember, the ancient prophets were persecuted in the same way. (Matt. 5:11‭-‬12 NLT)

Knowing full well that this is the life we have signed up for as followers of Christ, ours is to brace up for the persecution, wait for it's arrival and most importantly know that in the midst of the suffering, the problem is not any human being, institution it's devil who has desired to steal your soul, kill and destroy it.

So, we stand firm against the devil! We forgive his agents but we don't move an inch. We kwechiri on the word of God!

Regards,
Brother Ijay


*Nkuri is what Mom and Dad do in private before God sends them babies.
**Kwechiri is an Igbo word that means stand firm, don't give up, keep pushing.

Standing Firm Against The Devil ( #3)
Escaping the Trap of Satan's Temptation
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Stand firm against him, and be strong in your faith. Remember that your family of believers all over the world is going through the same kind of suffering you are. 1 Pet. 5:9 NLT

In my last note, I reminded you what you already know, which is that Satan has no power to just steal, kill and destroy anybody, especially people of God and that all he can do is lure people away from God to the position where he can deal with them.

One way he does it is to trick people by casting doubt on the clear, unambiguous word of God in the heart of children of God in a manner that makes them yield to thoughts and lifestyles that are inconsistent with the order of God. That's how he got Eve. He equally tried it with Jesus.

Aside from his tricks, his other tool is temptation. In this case, he does not just try to cast doubt in your mind about the word of God, he puts pressure to make you go against God's order, often with the false disposition to care about your welfare.

If you and I must successfully stand firm against the devil's mission to steal, kill and destroy in our lives, we must as a matter of necessity learn how to escape the trap of the devil as he comes tempting.

Just as God carries out His work through human beings, Satan equally works with human beings and that's where a good chunk of temptations will come from. The sad thing is that he sometimes uses those who are not just close to us but actually care for us.

Replete in the scriptures are instances of temptations of the devil, and the fall and rise of great men. I don't have the luxury of space to discuss each of them in this note; so I will take one that's often neglected by most good Christains–Peter & Jesus Christ.

You see, Satan is not entirely stupid. So, when he comes tempting, he is often not asking you to do what's bad per se. He comes across as a friend suggesting to you what will make you fine. He gives the vibe of a friend that loves you more than God could and wants your good as opposed to God that wants you to suffer.

In short, his approach is to appeal to the selfish part of you. That's when he borrowed Peter's mouth to tempt Jesus. He said to the Lord that ye must not die.

Jesus told His disciples that He was going to die for the whole world so that He will pay for our sins and deliver us from other nyama nyama gods in our villages and here is what transpired between Peter and Jesus.

But Peter took him aside and began to reprimand him for saying such things. “Heaven forbid, Lord,” he said. “This will never happen to you!” Jesus turned to Peter and said, “Get away from me, Satan! You are a dangerous trap to me. You are seeing things merely from a human point of view, not from God’s.”
(Matthew 16:22‭-‬23 NLT)

On the surface, he comes across as a friend that doesn't want anything bad to happen to his friend and master and deep down in his heart that may actually be true.

Incidentally, while he may have sounded good and caring, the truth is that Peter was speaking for Satan. He has a good heart but was seeing things merely from a human point of view and not from God's and that made him a ready tool in the hands of the devil.

Why?

As good as it is that you don't wish your close people death, if his wish for Jesus materialised, he would have succeeded in derailing Jesus away from the will of God for His life–die for the redemption of mankind.

The lesson for us in standing firm against the devil is that many of those who love us and care for us can be instruments in the hands of Satan in tempting us away from the order of God.

Even if we don't say the words for the sake of courtesy, our attitude should be that of the Lord Jesus, "Get behind me Satan."

📍Satan shows up in parents pressuring their children to study a particular course because of the delusion that their prosperity is tied to studying what they call lucrative courses.

Let them know that it's the Lord (NOT a course of study) that gives power to make wealth (Deut. 8:18) and when he blesses the works of my hands, I will prosper and do much that I will lend to nations and not borrow.

📍Satan equally manifests in wives pressuring their husbands to do things and become the kind of men they watch in movies, fit into her parent's expectations or meet up with certain social class even against the will of God for their lives.

Let your wife know that when God comes back, he will ask you what you did with what he gave you, not what he gave your neighbour or your wife's father and you will occupy with what he has given you until He comes. Matt 24:14-30

📍When friends, associates and even mentors suggest to pastors underhanded methods of raising money even when such methods are in direct opposition to the order of God, and try to justify it by telling them that such monies will be used for the advancement of the gospel, that's Satan at work.

Remind them that God owns the earth and everything in it and has always provided for His work. Educate him on the fact that there is no point manipulating the so-called money bag in church to bring money because if God considers their money acceptable for His work, He will move their heart to give. (Exo25; Pro 21:1)

📍Parents who lie to their children that every student is cheating in exams and arrange for them to go to exam centres where students use malpractice to get A in subjects they have zero grasp of the basics represent Satan on the parole in your home.

Educate them that carrying a certificate that says you made an A in a subject when the reality is that you have an empty head is living a lie. That's waking up a liar, walking on the road a liar and going to bed a lie. More importantly, let them know that God finished work when he created the human brain and if you pay attention and learn from a good teacher, you can learn ANYTHING. (Exodus 20:16; Rom 13:1; Prov 4:1)

📍My brother, Satan is at work in that father, mother or uncle that's telling you to get a girl pregnant before marrying her to be on the safeside with the excuse that girls these days are wayward and that even those you find in church are ashawo-don-repent.

Let them know that you are not a Christian because your name is Emmanuel but because God is your father and He delights in every detail about your life, including marriage. Remind them that God is one who makes even barren women joyful mothers of children, not the girl's virginity. Remind him that your steps are guided by God and God is so good that He can scatter any relationship He knows is not for my good. (Psa. 37:23-25; 113:9)

📍You see those men in your workplace who are aware that your wife doesn't have enough sense to give you nkuri as and when due and they have started advising you to carry another girl so that your wife will 'come back to her senses' when she sees competition, they are men of Satan.

Help them know that God's design is that the marriage bed must not be defiled and sleeping with another woman that's not your wife is inviting evil spirits that can destroy your home, make your children wayward and utterly destroy you. Help them understand that the energy used in chasing a daughter of Jezebel can be repurposed in making peace with your wife and teaching your wife nkuri 101. (1 Cor 6:16-20; Heb 13:4)

📍Dear youth, that renowned, Harvard-trained, Yale-certified relationship coach or séx therapist advising you to sleep with someone that's not your spouse to test your sexual compatibility is a spokesperson for Satan. Don't be deceived by her statistics and decades of experiences to back up her message from the devil.

There is no experience anyone has that can beat God's own or certification that makes any man or group of scholars come close to God's capacity to guide anyone right. God said, keep yourself until marriage, it's safest to trust Him than any scholar or statistics! (Prov3:19; Isaiah 55:9)

In short, once people start giving advice, no matter how good and innocent it appears but it clearly contradicts the order of God, Satan is at work for them, at least for that moment.

Stand firm against them. Don't move an inch. Kwechiri on the word of God!



Regards,
Brother Ijay